March Madness

March was quite the month for us.  Here's how it played out...

It started out fun.  Seth and his buddy Alex decided to do a comedy act for the school talent show.  I helped them with their jokes, and they ended up getting a lot of laughs!  It turns out that Seth has quite the sense of humor.  In first grade he received the 'best sense of humor' award at the end of the year, and we were so shocked!  But now we can really see why.  He enjoys making other people laugh.  We loved seeing his confidence on stage.  They did a really great job.

On the first Saturday of March, Shane took Seth, Luke, and Seth's friend, Grant, to Home Depot for kids project day.  They made weather vanes and were so proud of them.

But their fun day quickly turned into a bummer of a day when they got back home and started painting their weather vanes in the garage.  Shane bent down to pick up a screw and heard a pop in his knee.  That was the beginning of a very long season of doctor visits, surgeries, rehab visits, and medical bills.  Shane was in a lot of pain those first few days.  His knee swelled up really bad and he couldn't even straighten it.  An MRI quickly revealed that he had a torn meniscus.  His other knee had been giving him problems since he tore it on a ski trip in '99 and had it surgically repaired.  So the doctor decided to scan that one too, which showed a torn patella tendon and chronic tendonitis.  So before we knew it, Shane was scheduled for double knee surgery.

In the meantime, Spring Break came without consideration of Shane's injuries.  But luckily, Grammy and Pops drove into town and saved the day (or the week, really!)  The kids absolutely loved spending time with them.  They went to the zoo, the butterfly garden, the park, and made lots of shopping trips.  Here are a few pictures of that week from Grammy's camera.

When Spring Break was over, Grammy and Pops went to Houston to visit some friends.  But before heading back home they came back to help us out while Shane had his surgery.  We were so very thankful for their help.  Here are Shane's before-and-after shots.

The surgery went better than expected.  They were able to easily repair the patella tendon in his left knee and do some blood injections for the tendonitis.  That knee healed really quickly and was back at 100% in no time.  The plan for his right knee changed during surgery when the doctor realized he could actually repair the meniscus instead of removing it as planned.  This was great news, but it did require a much longer recovery time than expected, keeping him in a brace and on crutches until May 6.  In the end, we were really thankful he was able to get everything fixed!

And then before we knew it, Spring was here!  And with Spring came more snow!  But that didn't stop Mommy and Kallie from our first pedicures of the season!